The Mettaboy Report

 La relation armée-peuple  vit des mutations radicales jamais enregistrée dans l’histoire du Cameroun et susceptible d’avoir des conséquences politiques inattendues. L’armée camerounaise a été mise sur pied en toile de fond de la rébellion du maquis contre la colonisation avec une approche doctrinale ancrée autour de la sécurité des régimes politiques successifs. Ainsi, l’armée perçoit dans le régime sa raison d’être en tant qu’institution clé, garant de ses privilèges  et de son prestige.  Pour elle, la protection de la société est perçue comme secondaire et tributaire de la sécurité du régime.  La thèse est la suivante: tout changement de régime met en péril les privilèges spéciaux de l'armée et sèmera chaos et instabilité sociale. Un immense gap a toujours existé entre l'armée et la majorité de la population dans les domaines de la politique et de la démocratie. Les régimes successifs ont préservé et entretenu cette fracture afin d'assurer leur propre ...

The relationship between citizens and their army is changing fast like never before in Cameroon, with unintended implications for peace and stability. Created on the back of fighting a bloody domestic insurgency against colonialization, the over fifty year old army anchors firmly its doctrine around ensuring the security of the regime. The military establishment also perceives protection of the ruling government as the core component of its mandate. Arguably, this is based on the assumption that regime instability would not be conducive to the military’s privileged position and would leave the country vulnerable to chaos, instability and ultimate failure of society. Thus, for the army, providing security services against threats to society is only part of its raison d'être.  Considering the military’s interest in regime stability as well as in providing security against threats to society, a perennial and wide gulf has therefore existed between the army and majority of the po...

On October 20, the World Health Organization officially declared Africa's most populous country ‘’Ebola free’’, 42 days since the last case was confirmed in Nigeria. The ‘’world class’’ swiftness and forceful response to quash the scary epidemic which killed seven of its citizens, pales greatly when compare to the dysfunctional response of the Government, so far in the face of Boko Haram, a terrorist group which has killed more than 1500 civilians, in just the first three months of 2014. Boko Haram, in fact, still holds more than 250 girls in captivity— even against the international outcry, and the Nigerian government’s recent announcement of having reached a deal with the Islamic militants for their release. Much ink continues to spill on how the Government accomplished such an epidemiological feat which so far, seems to elude even the US, the most resource endowed healthcare system. But without understanding why Nigeria got everything right on ebola, little applicable les...

Few emergencies in modern history have cumulated an endless list of frightening superlatives in such a short period of time. Within a couple of months, the West African Ebola Virus Outbreak (EVO) has been qualified as: public health emergency of international concern, extraordinary event, uncontrollable, fatally inadequate, exponential in growth, unprecedented, catastrophic, worst ever and greatest peace time threat. Since the outbreak ten months ago, it is only now that the international community seems to wake up albeit in panic to the ravaging scale of the epidemic. The response so far, has revealed an epic failure of collective actions at the global level for addressing African health challenges— something akin to a ''Rwandan moment'', when the international community fatally underestimated, misread and dithered to avert genocide. But a lack of farsighted leadership by Africa has not only mishandled the epidemic but also squandered a chance to show the world ...

The Indian Ocean island nation of 22 million people is famous for at least two things: its unique pristine biological diversity and its recurrent political turmoil— the most recent which ended last January with the election of a new President. But there’s another striking feature about Madagascar which barely gets notice even by its professional watchers: the relations between political crises and its business cycles. Economic growth and politics apparently operate at cross purposes. Growth spurts generates political crises in cyclical fashion.  Economic prosperity in Madagascar displays a destructive impulse: elites fight over its spoils in a way that end up sinking the whole country into periodic political turmoil and recessions. The Madagascar Cycle As the country slowly recovers from one of its most damaging political crisis which started in 2009, the newly elected President, Hery  Rajaonarimampianina seems to want do the right things. Sustained economic growth rema...

A surprised press conference held last month  by Emory University Teaching Hospital, stands out as a rare bright moment in the fight against an uncontrollable Ebola virus outbreak in West Africa.  ZMAPP, an untested serum-based therapy in humans was successfully administered to two American health workers who were later declared free from the virus, which has killed more than 1500 peoples. While more trials were still needed to ascertain the effectiveness of the drug, the public announcement raised hopes for a new front in the fight against the ravaging epidemic. Besides treatments for its debilitating fever, bleeding symptoms including palliative care as well as public health measures to contain the disease-- such as quarantining -- no licensed cures so far exist. This most deadly outbreak kills on average six out of ten patients, one more than all previous outbreaks together since 1976, when the virus first emerged. The number could climb to nine out of ten patients, at t...